This Reuters story seems a bit too excited by coalition setbacks so far. Headlined “Apache Down and Another U.S. Symbol Dented,” it begins: “U.S. military prowess suffered another setback in Iraq on Monday and another omen that bullets rather than liberators’ garlands may await the invasion force when it finally reaches Baghdad.”

Fair enough, I suppose. But it seems to me that a half-dozen presidential palaces, Iraqi security forces, and thousands of surrenders constitute not merely “symbolic dents” in Iraqi power but, well, actual dents in Iraqi power. Lets not make every lost helicopter into another Tet Offensive, ok?

Jonah Goldberg